World News - Ballots checked as Italy election turmoil goes on One local newspaper compares situation to Florida recount

Judges began checking tens of thousands of contested ballots Thursday, as Italian politics was thrown into turmoil after Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s demand for a recount of rival Romano Prodi’s narrow parliamentary election victory.Official returns gave Prodi’s center-left coalition the majority in both houses of parliament in the April 9-10 elections — but the margin was a mere 25,000 votes in lower Chamber of Deputies.One Italian newspaper even compared the scenario to the disputed balloting in Florida during the U.S. presidential race in 2000. 'We are serene,' Prodi saysProdi insisted Thursday that his victory is safe.“There is nothing to worry about; we are serene,” he said in Bologna, according to Italy’s ANSA and Apcom news agencies.Berlusconi has refused to concede, saying late Wednesday that the margin of victory was slim enough to require “a scrupulous check to ascertain any possible error or irregularity.”... http://www.msnbc.msn.com

Pakistani troops deployed Thursday to the streets of Karachi to curb rioting and vandalism that flared in this southern city for a third day following a suicide bombing that killed 57 people at a Sunni Muslim prayer service. The deployments, the first here since Shiite-Sunni unrest in the early 1990s, took place hours before mass funerals were expected for three leaders of the moderate Sunni Tehrik group who were among those killed in Tuesday's attack, one of Pakistan's deadliest ever. "We are deploying troops in the city at sensitive places and if needed the troops will help the civil administration in maintenance of peace and order," said Col. Idrees Malik, a Pakistan army spokesman in Karachi. Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz flew to Karachi, Pakistan's largest city, and met with Sunni leaders and security officials in a bid to calm seething tensions and restore security. ...http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/04/13/world/main1496212.shtml?source=RSS&attr=World_1496212

North Korea threatened Thursday to use a delay in international nuclear disarmament talks to bolster its military "deterrent force," a phrase it often uses to refer to its purported atomic weapons. North Korea has said it has nuclear weapons, although the claim has not been verified independently. "It's not bad that the resumption of nuclear talks is delayed. During that period, we will make more deterrent force," the North's top nuclear envoy, Kim Kye Gwan, told a news conference. "We will react in an ultra hard-line manner if the United States continues to apply pressure and sanctions. We will never yield to pressure," Kim said. ...http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=1838850

A couple accused of falsely claiming they were the new parents of sextuplets apologized Wednesday for scheming to tap into their neighbors' generosity."We're sorry for everything we did," Sarah Everson said from the driveway of their home. Her husband, Kris Everson, vowed to pay back those who sent money or other items."We didn't mean to hurt anybody," he said. "We did it out of financial reasons."The couple could face criminal charges for collecting cash and other gifts after making public their story of six newborn babies clinging to life. Police were still investigating how much money and other help the couple received.Police Chief Aaron Ambrose said detectives would seek records on donations made through a bank fund set up for the Eversons, a post office box established to receive mailed gifts and an online PayPal account that allowed visitors to the couple's Web site to give money....http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/04/13/sextuplet.scam.ap/index.html?section=cnn_us

Police in Pennsylvania say they have discovered six bodies in a home, some of them wrapped in sheets and blankets in the basement. It was not immediately clear how the victims died, although officials said one had an obvious head wound. A hammer was reportedly found in a bedroom. Police were interviewing "a person of interest" after the discovery in Leola, AP news agency reported. The victims have not been formally identified, the local coroner said. ...http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4907244.stm

The Bush administration yesterday denounced a Washington Post report that questioned the handling of postwar intelligence on alleged Iraqi biological weapons labs. A White House spokesman acknowledged that President Bush's assertions about the suspected labs were in error but said this was caused by flawed intelligence work rather than an effort to mislead. The Post reported yesterday that a Pentagon-appointed team of technical experts had strongly rejected the weapons claim in a field report sent to the Defense Intelligence Agency on May 27, 2003. That report, and an authoritative, 122-page final report by the same team three weeks later, concluded that the trailers were not biological weapons labs. Also the Brits told Bush right off the bat that they sold those trailers to Iraq and what they were, and they had nothing to do with "biological laboratories" in any way. However, Bush ignored it and kept insisting they were "biological laboratories.” Is that just a minor error?...http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/12/AR2006041201789_pf.html